Vin­ode Mam­chan

Mid­dle or­der bats­man Ja­son Mo­hammed will lead the T&T Red Force in the Nagi­co Re­gion­al Su­per50 crick­et tour­na­ment, which bowls off on Jan­u­ary 7 in Trinidad.

Mo­hammed re­places all rounder Rayad Em­rit, who led the team to the ti­tle last sea­son. The T&T Crick­et Board ex­plained that Mo­hammed was ap­point­ed cap­tain for the rest of sea­son com­menc­ing with his ap­point­ment in the re­cent­ly-con­clud­ed first half of the PCL 4 Day. The de­ci­sion was in keep­ing with the po­si­tion tak­en by the se­lec­tors, when pre­vi­ous­ly De­nesh Ramdin and Dar­ren Bra­vo were re­placed by Em­rit as cap­tain, giv­en that they were not avail­able for the en­tire sea­son, across all for­mats.

At the time of the team se­lec­tion, Em­rit was in the draft for the Pak­istan Crick­et League which is sched­uled for Feb­ru­ary. In an at­tempt to main­tain lead­er­ship sta­bil­i­ty with­in the team, the se­lec­tors rec­om­mend­ed Mo­hammed and this was rat­i­fied by the Ex­ec­u­tive Com­mit­tee.

The Red Force will be sev­er­ly weak­ened as most of the se­nior play­ers will not be avail­able. Kieron Pol­lard is cur­rent­ly in­jured and was not con­sid­ered as was Shan­non Gabriel. Sunil Nar­ine is un­der sus­pen­sion for an il­le­gal bowl­ing ac­tion. Dwayne Bra­vo, Lendl Sim­mons and Samuel Badree are un­avail­able due to Big Bash com­mit­ments in Aus­tralia.

Ravi Ram­paul was not con­sid­ered as there was un­cer­tain­ty sur­round­ing his avail­abil­i­ty at the time of se­lec­tion. Ear­li­er, Ram­paul, through his agent, had asked for his re­tain­er con­tract to be ter­mi­nat­ed fol­low­ing the tour of Sri Lan­ka. Up­on their re­turn from Aus­tralia both De­nesh Ramdin and Dar­ren Bra­vo will join the team.

Two new­com­ers in fast bowler Philton Williams and spin­ner John Russ-Jagges­sar have been called up for se­nior du­ties.

Jagges­sar plays for Cal­drac Sports club in cen­tral and has been very im­pres­sive, while Philton the for­mer T&T Un­der-19 fast bowler makes his se­nior de­but.

The tour­na­ment will have 27 match­es over 18 days in the biggest, se­nior re­gion­al do­mes­tic 50-overs-a-side tour­na­ment to be ever staged by the West In­dies Crick­et Board (WICB).

It will be co-host­ed in St Kitts/ Nevis.

The Red Force, who are de­fend­ing cham­pi­ons, will open their ac­count against the Ja­maica Scor­pi­ons in a Zone A en­counter; while Bar­ba­dos Pride will face new­com­ers, ICC Amer­i­c­as. In the oth­er group, beat­en fi­nal­ist Guyana Jaguars will face the Wind­ward Is­lands Vol­ca­noes; while the Lee­ward Is­lands Hur­ri­canes will face the CCC Ma­roon­ers in St Kitts/Nevis

In the pre­lim­i­nary round, each team is sched­uled to play six match­es in a non-elim­i­na­tion for­mat and top two teams in each zone will move to the se­mi-fi­nals due to start, Wednes­day, Jan­u­ary 20 at the Queen's Park Oval. Win­ners from the semis will then play in the fi­nal on Sat­ur­day, Jan­u­ary 23 al­so at the Queen's Park Oval.

Last year's fi­nal was a one-sided af­fair when the Red Force clob­bered the Jaguars by a 135-runs mar­gin.

SCHED­ULE & TEAM

Group A: T&T Red Force, Ja­maica Scor­pi­ons, Bar­ba­dos Pride, ICC Amer­i­c­as

Group B: Guyana Jaguars, CCC Ma­roon­ers, Wind­ward Is­lands Vol­ca­noes, Lee­ward Is­lands Hur­ri­canes

Open­ing Match­es: Thurs­day, Jan­u­ary 7

Red Force vs Scor­pi­ons � Queen's Park Oval � TT 1.30 pm)

Pride vs Amer­i­c­as � UWI SPEC TT � 9 am

Jaguars vs Vol­ca­noes � St Paul's � SKN � 9 am

Hur­ri­canes vs Ma­roon­ers � Warn­er Park � SKN � 1.30 pm

T&T team: Evin Lewis, Kyle Hope, Yan­nick Ot­t­ley, Nars­ingh De­onar­ine, Ja­son Mo­hammed (cap­tain), Kjorn Ot­t­ley, Steven Kat­wa­roo, Im­ran Khan, Rayad Em­rit, Akeal Ho­sein, Philton Williams, Jon Russ Jage­sar, Kevon Coop­er and Mar­lon Richards.

Man­age­ment: Gus Lo­gie (Head Coach), Kelvin Williams (As­sist Coach), Roland Sam­path (Man­ag­er) and Adarayll John (Strength & Con­di­tion­ing Coach). Phys­io­ther­a­pist to be named.